Video Lecture Series (open to all)

Remote Management of DCS

Check out this talk with Dr. Nick Bird and learn signs and symptoms of decompression sickness; diagnostic criteria and treatment options in remote areas; and important factors that may help guide decisions about treatment versus evacuation.

Est. Time: 24 minutes

Does CPR Really Work?

Frances Smith, MS, EMT-P, DMT and DAN Education Programs Trainer offers insight to the importance of administering CPR to victims immediately after an incident and training opportunities available through DAN.

Est. Time: 2 minutes

Children and Diving

Dr. David Charash highlights important considerations for making informed decisions regarding children and diving.

Est. Time: 22 minutes

Aging and Diving

While older age is not a contraindication, it's important to have a framework for making informed decisions about diving as we age. Michael Strauss, MD, addresses these important concepts in his presentation "Aging and Diving: Guideline for Diving in Older Aged Individuals" from The Science of Wound Care, Diving and Hyperbaric Medicine 3rd Annual Conference and Expo.

Defining Dive Safety for Public Safety Divers

Est. Time: 22 minutes

Challenges in Diagnosing DCI

Decompression injuries are rare but potentially very serious events. Accurate diagnosis is critical to ensure rapid and appropriate care. The absence of objective measures can make this a good part art as well as science. It is important for all - divers, dive professionals and medical professionals - to appreciate the details and nuance that can improve diagnosis. This presentation by DAN Medic Marty McCafferty will consider conditions in both the prehospital and clinical settings that can improve diagnosis and care of divers.

Est. Time: 40 minutes

How Good is Your Emergency Action Plan?

This presentation by Marty McCafferty, discusses what information is most valuable at the time of an emergency and the rationale for having such information.

Est. Time: 41 minutes

Dive Accident Management

Est. Time: 44 minutes

Diver Fatalities

This lecture provides information about Diver Fatalities presented by DAN's president Dan Orr.

Est. Time: 45 minutes

Medications and Diving

This lecture provides an up-to-date approach to the issue of medications and diving. Emphasized is a systems approach to evaluate medical fitness to dive questions for divers who are either taking or will take medications.

Est. Time: 39 minutes

Online Training Seminars (login required)

The Optimal Path

In this lecture, Dr. Vann discusses the search for the optimal path to safe decompression from a dive and the struggle to determine acceptable risk.

Est. Time: 1.5 hours

Breathing Underwater is an Unnatural Act

Diving is easy under ideal conditions, but life on dry land doesn’t prepare us for the underwater environment where conditions can be far from ideal. How these conditions affect respiration and consciousness is the subject of this presentation.

Est. Time: 1.5 hours

Diabetes & Recreational Diving

Learn about diabetes and the new guidelines for diving with it in this presentation by Neal W. Pollock, Ph.D., a research physiologist with DAN.

Est. Time: 1.5 hours

Inert Gas Exchange, Bubbles, and Decompression Theory

Dr. Richard Vann, Vice President of Research at DAN, presented a lecture addressing some of the fundamental principles that govern inert gas exchange between the environment and tissue, and in particular, the profound effects that bubble formation can have on inert gas exchange. These ideas are placed in a historical context to show how decompression theory has evolved and how this has affected the severity of DCS.

Est. Time: 1.5 hours

Pathophysiology of Decompression Illness

Dr. Richard Moon, Senior Medical Consultant to DAN, presented this lecture to a recent Diving and Hyperbaric Medicine course. It features audio clips of Dr. Moon explaining issues including patent foramen ovale and the mechanical damage caused by gas bubbles in the body along with the history of decompression illness research and current research into ways to treat injured divers.

Est. Time: 1.5 hours

Ears and Diving Seminar

In spite of being one of the least understood, the ears are one of the most important body parts in the human body – especially as they relate to diving. This seminar is designed as a primer on how the ears function and the things divers must do to take care of their ears. It will help divers understand their ears and what is happening when they dive. Based on a presentation by Dr. Frans Cronje.

Est. Time: 1 hour

Dan Orr, M.S.

President of Divers Alert Network

Dan Orr came to Divers Alert Network in 1991 as Director of Training. He was responsible for developing and implementing DAN training programs including the internationally successful DAN Oxygen First Aid Course. Prior to coming to DAN, he was the Associate Diving Officer at Florida State University and, before that, he was Director of Diver Training Programs at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio. Dan has Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Biology and has authored and contributed to many books and magazine articles including co-author of Scuba Diving Safety and DAN's Pocket Guide for Diving Safety series.

Nick Bird, M.D.

Dr. Bird is the CEO and Chief Medical Officer at DAN and oversees the mission departments of medicine, research and education. He started diving in 1984 and became an instructor in 1989. He taught diving in southern and northern California prior to attending medical school. After medical school he completed a residency in family medicine, and subsequently joined the US Air Force as a flight surgeon and served in Iraq. He received his initial training in hyperbaric medicine while stationed at Travis Air Force Base and completed a fellowship in diving and hyperbaric medicine at the University of California San Diego. He then served as the medical director for hyperbaric medicine at Dixie Regional Medical Center in St. George, UT prior to coming to DAN.

Marty McCafferty, EMT-P, DMT-A and DAN Medical Information Specialist

Marty has been both a dive instructor and a paramedic since 1995. He has worked as a paramedic in the field, in an ER and as an EMS supervisor at an Ohio theme park. He also has experience training students with disabilities to dive. Additionally he was certified as an AHA BLS and First Aid instructor as well as an EMT instructor. He has been with DAN since 2004.

Marty’s passion is education. In 2006 he developed DAN’s Webinar program, where divers from around the world login to real-time lectures with DAN Medics on a variety of dive safety related topics. In 2007 Marty recorded DAN’s first dive safety DVD lecture, "I May Be Bent…Now What?" Each year, Marty represents DAN at consumer and industry dive shows as well as professional level conferences, providing lectures, seminars and workshops on various topics related to diving medicine. Marty’s intention is to continue his own education and continue working to develop new educational opportunities for the diving public.

Scott Smith, EMT-P, is the DAN Medical Information Specialist & Prehospital Medicine Course Director. He is an EMS instructor who teaches several prehospital medicine courses including Diver Medical Technician, Advanced Cardiovascular Life Support and Basic Life Support, among others. Smith specializes in working with public safety dive teams and prehospital medicine providers on education regarding diving medicine and has a background in clinical hyperbaric medicine. Smith has been diving since 1992 and has been a diving instructor since 1998.

Frances Smith, MS, EMT-P, DMT and DAN Education Program Trainer

Frances Smith is a certified DMT and DAN Examiner. She has been a paramedic for 25 years, a public safety diver, a firefighter and emergency first responder. Frances has more than 20 years of experience in laboratory research with a focus in biochemistry, molecular biology and clinical trials. She also has four years of experience teaching as a clinical faculty instructor for University of North Carolina Chapel Hill medical students.

David Charash, DO

Dr. Charash currently serves as the medical director for the Wound Care and Hyperbaric Medicine division of the Danbury Hospital in Connecticut. He is Board certified in Emergency Medicine and Undersea and Hyperbaric Medicine. Dr. Charash has completed both the UHMS/NOAA Dive Medicine Physician, and UHMS Medical Evaluation of Diver programs. Dr. Charash is a DAN Referral Physician, DAN Instructor, and PADI Diver. He lectures locally and nationally on topics of dive safety and dive medicine.

Michael Strauss, MD

Dr. Strauss is an undersea and hyperbaric medicine expert. After completing U.S. Navy Submarine and Diving Medical Schools, Dr. Strauss served on a nuclear submarine, with salvage divers in the Philippines and Vietnam and with the SEAL teams in San Diego. After these fleet experiences, Dr. Strauss completed his orthopaedic surgery residency at the Navy Medical Center, San Diego. He was released from active duty in 1977, but remained with the Navy SEAL reserve teams until his retirement from the Naval Reserve in the year 2000, concluding a 34 1/2 year affiliation.

Dr. Strauss is a Clinical Professor of Orthopaedic Surgery at the University of California Irvine as well as the orthopaedic consultant for the PACT (Preservation-Amputation, Care, and Treatment) Clinic at the Veterans Affairs Health Care Medical Center, Long Beach, Calif. Dr. Strauss has written two text books ("Diving Science," 2004 and "MasterMinding Wounds," 2010), three chapters for Kindwall's 2008 "Hyperbaric Medicine Practice" text as well as more than 100 publications on orthopaedic, diving medicine, hyperbaric medicine and wound management subjects as well as an equal number of posters and exhibits.

Christopher Logue, MD

Dr. Christopher Logue graduated medical school from the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. He currently serves as the health system's clinician/clinical instructor, emergency department physician at Penn Presbyterian Medical Center and the hyperbaric medicine attending physician at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Christopher became a SCUBA Instructor in 1993 through the National Association of Underwater Instructors (NAUI) and he still remains in active status.

Richard Sadler, MD

An active diver since 1988, Dr. Richard Sadler attended the Medical College of Virginia and completed his surgery residence at the University of California– Irvine, followed by simultaneous Vascular and Thoracic Surgery residencies at the University of Iowa. Desiring to reconnect with his trauma experience, he merged his General Surgery and CV expertise and started the nonprofit Med Force Helicopter EMS system with a used Bell 222. He completed the NOAA Diving Medical Officer Course and became Board Certified in Underwater Medicine. He received his PADI Divemaster certification from the Kapalua Dive Company. He currently is an active Public Safety Diver, and is medical director for the Dive Rescue International training agency.

His professional interests include surgery of the aorta, underwater medicine and the evolution of crew resource management and human factors applications to the operating room environment. Additional appointments include Safety Officer for the Mississippi Valley Surgery Center in Davenport, Iowa.